


Struggle and Strive Just to Stay Alive

by illwynd



Category: Thor (Comics), Thor - All Media Types, Thors
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Child Abuse, Crimes & Criminals, Homelessness, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Underage Masturbation, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-26
Updated: 2015-09-26
Packaged: 2018-04-23 11:00:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4874230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/illwynd/pseuds/illwynd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The only thing Loki’s ever found in his life that makes him important is what he can do because no one notices the mad bum in the fuzzy hat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Struggle and Strive Just to Stay Alive

**Author's Note:**

> I was reading the new _Thors_ comic and I really needed to know how Loki wound up living in a cardboard box. This will make more sense if you have read 1-3 in that series, though there aren't any real spoilers in this fic. 
> 
> Title stolen from Everlast's "I Get By." 
> 
> Feedback loved here or on [tumblr](http://illwynd.tumblr.com/post/129900636310/struggle-and-strive-just-to-stay-alive-ao3-4k). :)

**Age 30**

Loki has the dream again. “The dream,” he says, though really it’s different every time. It’s still the same dream. In this one, he’s a… a prince, a god? He’s surrounded by gold and majesty, and he’s the one standing on the dais, and a million people are cheering. He smiles, magnanimous, takes it as his due. He’s not alone, though. A big hand claps upon his shoulder, and a dozen emotions fleet through him at once. Annoyance. Frustration. Anticipation. Happiness… and just as he is turning, he wakes.

The memory of who it was is the first part of the dream to fade, leaving just golden hair and a vague impression of broad shoulders. The feeling lasts longer. The one that tells him it was the same dream. The sense that in the dream, he mattered. He was important.

He wakes and stares up at the cardboard sky. Rubs the sleep away, the roughness of his fingerless gloves scraping against the skin around his eyes. Sits and hurls last night’s empty bottle down toward the dumpster, where it smashes into brilliant shards.

He hates the dream. No, he hates knowing that the only thing he’s ever found in his life that makes him important is what he can do because no one notices the mad bum in the fuzzy hat. What he can overhear because no one even sees him.

And it isn’t right. He was supposed to _be someone_. He knows it in his bones, has known it all his life, but it just never… happened.  

He tramps through the alleys that day unsettled, still feeling a hand upon his shoulder, hating the dream and longing for something that will never be his.

 

**Age 25**

He’s been in New York for almost five years now, and he’s well on his way to becoming king under the mountain.

He’d stumbled a lot at first. Got chased out of a lot of territory. Got a few bruises. Spent the first half of age 21 in jail for residential burglary (and almost made it a year for talking back to the judge), but he’d made the most of it. Read books he’d never had time for before. Listened to everything he heard. Learned, learned well, learned fast. Learned how to stay out of jail next time. Even made a few “friends.”

He’s done well.

He’s got his own place, rent free, where nobody knows to look for him. Put together from bits and pieces, furnished with all the luxuries he can scrounge. He brings in enough for comfort, and it’s only going to get better.

His network is small, and they don’t deal in any of the usual trades, except around the edges, but it’s like a glimmering web through the city, invisible except under a certain kind of light. He has eyes and ears everywhere. He knows who’s killing who. Who’s selling to who, and who’s being bought. He hears all the rumors, all the gossip. He finds out everything and hoards it all. He’s got the black market for secrets cornered.

Everybody around him having to hustle and scramble to get by, but the world is his kingdom, and there’s nothing he can’t handle.  

He maneuvers until he is ready to leverage his power for greater power. To move into new games. New arenas, where his talents could prove just as useful. And due to the nature of his work, he knows just who he must talk to to make it happen.

He’s standing in a small, exclusive club in the middle of Manhattan, a place no one knows about unless they’ve been invited there, his beat-up old boots a contrast against the spotless persian rugs. Crystal chandeliers. Everything rich hardwood and marble and polished brass. He shifts his backpack on his shoulder.

He’s got no illusions about what he is. He knows he’s a bum, but he’s a bum who knows things. He has value.

The man he’s come to see—deep charcoal Italian suit, tidy red-blond ponytail, steely blue eyes, heavy gold ring on one finger, details that Loki will remember later, details that make what happens all the more maddening—looks him up and down as he makes his proposition.

“And who the fuck are you?” he asks, head tilted, when Loki finishes.

He doesn’t even give Loki a chance to explain before he’s made a little gesture with two fingers in the air, and then there are hands clamped on his upper arms.

They didn’t know who he was. Loki has never been so furious, fury like ice swelling and bursting him from the inside.

The next day he’s in his usual spot, legs folded under him on the pavement, cup of cheap coffee cooling in styrofoam between his hands,  when the cops come snooping around asking questions, saying they’re looking for a murderer, someone who may have killed a mob boss the night before.

“For some reason his people think it might have been a transient,” one of the badges tells him, a woman who looks at him with something approaching pity in her eyes. Loki despises her for it a little, except she usually pays well. Even for his lies. “We’re pretty sure they’re full of it and they’re covering up some sort of turf war, but we have to check. And we know you’ve always got an ear to the ground, Loki, so… heard anything like that?”

He shakes his head and doesn’t say a word.

It’s not guilt. He doesn’t feel guilty, even if he can still see the man’s eyes—swollen, blood vessels burst, shocked to find he could be killed, shocked to find that someone could sneak into his bedroom and get the rope around his neck before he could even wake up, shocked by the dimming of the lights around him—can still see that in perfect detail whenever he closes his.

He only did what he had to do. Had to prove that he matters. Is not someone to be ignored. Did what he had to do. Doesn’t care that it will mean lying low for a very long time.

It doesn’t matter. He isn’t afraid. He likes it in the shadows, the shadows that have long since become home.

He did what he had to do. It was only what he had to do. 

The man didn’t even know his name.

 

**Age 20**

He knows it was a stupid choice, now, but it took him surprisingly long to figure out.

They almost didn’t take him. His academic record was shaky, just barely up to snuff. His test scores were better, a lot better, but the recruiter still looked at him with narrowed eyes over a heavy folder before giving him a nod and saying he was in the army now.

Two years later, he’s not sure why he was even there. It’s not like he wanted to follow in dear ol’ dad’s footsteps. Maybe just because that’s what former foster kids _did_. A way to make something of themselves and not wind up on the streets, make use of the GI bill and slide their way into a serious gig at the end of it. Maybe he’d liked the idea that they’d train him to be tough, too, so that he could handle the trouble his mouth usually got him into. Maybe he just really hadn’t thought it through.

A month into basic—long enough that anyone with sense would have seen it a dozen times over—he’d finally figured out what a mistake he’d made.

The physical part was fine; even if he was skinny, he was stronger than he looked, and he had always been fast. But what wasn’t going to work out was him being told what to do by people with double-digit IQs.

Loki just didn’t deal well with authority. Particularly authorities he didn’t trust or like or respect, and the number of authorities that left was vanishingly small.

So eight weeks later he was standing at a bus stop, piece of paper saying he wasn’t cut out to be a soldier shoved in his backpack, the reddened, sweating faces of screaming drill sergeants—and the onrushing vengeance of everyone else around him—stamped forever on his memory.

And all the money he had just barely got him on that bus.

The bus took him away from South Carolina, his head lolling back against the headrest, its threadbare reds and blues a dull pattern in the corner of his eye, as a deep relief settled through his guts.

He didn’t need anyone telling him what to do.

For the first time in his life, nobody controlled him. Not his father, not Child Services, not the army.

That was what he held onto for the next year and a half. He was living on his own terms, and he’d never let anyone control him again.

Through the nights he shivered under railway bridges, wrapped in a blanket and empty stomach gurgling, waking up with heart pounding each time the trains rumbled by like the loudest thunderstorm in existence, comforting and terrifying and the lack of rest building up behind his eyeballs until he was fairly sure he was actually hallucinating, no chemical assistance needed.

Through the days under hot sun reflecting off black asphalt, eyes squinting and arm tired and thumb still in the air, sweat dripping down his back under his t-shirt, miles away from anything.

Through wary meetings, squat houses with boarded-up windows and red stains on the carpet, and he couldn’t pass up the offer to share their food. Eating fire-warmed chili from a can with half a dozen others talking and joking together, while he drew his folded legs up closer to his chest, silent and uneasy, feeling more alone than before.

No one controlled him, and no one would ever control him again, and even though it wasn’t a comfortable life, it would have been enough. He would have been fine with that. Miserable and lonesome and happy and completely free.

Except everywhere he went it felt like he was waiting for something. Every face, looking for one he knew.

He’d started traveling again on a whim. On an impulse, a feeling.

Tonight, somewhere in Kansas, with trucks on the interstate whistling by every few seconds, with the evening sky an unsettling shade of sickly amber above the endless windswept fields, Loki’s pup tent seeming at every moment like it’s about to be blown to pieces and his heart in his throat, he decides to make an attempt at scrying. Pours a precious little bit of water into the lid of an old coffee tin. Gets out his knife and makes a cut on the tender flesh of his inner arm.

_Drip, drip, drip._

He watches the blood spiral into the shivering water, the patterns it makes.

It rains overnight, the yellow-brown grass damp and soggy under his knees when he climbs out in the morning, but at least he knows where he’s going when he hits the road.

_Head east, young man._

 

**Age 15**

He discovers magic accidentally.

He’s been in the same group home for almost a year, and since Hugo aged out he’s been the oldest. That means he gets his own bedroom, can finally jerk off in peace. It’s early on a rainy Saturday morning, the sheets pushed down and the baggy old t-shirt he sleeps in rucked up almost to his armpits, nipples tight in the chill air, spitting on his fingers and tugging on himself, other hand cupping his balls. He doesn’t normally fantasize much. Doesn’t usually have the time for anything more than getting himself off as fast as possible before anyone can walk in on him. This time he risks it.

He tries to think of girls but it doesn’t really work. He likes girls, he knows he does, but obviously not that much. Thinking of guys he knows, though, that doesn’t help much either, because he _knows_ them and he can’t stand any of them. _Someone I don’t know, then. Come on, Loki. Imagination_. He knows what appeals to him, at least. _Big, blond, athletic, cute. The kind of guy everyone thinks is straight._

Loki imagines his imaginary partner on his knees behind the high school in the middle of the day, imagines him sucking Loki off, Loki’s back against the brick, hands tangled in soft hair. Feeling like he’s corrupting him with every time he chokes a little and backs off, goes back to just licking until Loki pulls him down again.

Loki bites his lip to keep from moaning as he imagines coming on his imaginary blond’s face, spills over his fist in rapid pulses, pale chest shuddering. Afterward his mind goes completely blank for a few long moments, staring up at the ceiling. His fingers are idly playing in the white puddle on his abdomen, tracing it around in little whorls and zig-zags.

 _The room probably stinks like jizz now_ , is his first thought when he comes back to himself.

A few minutes later, after a quick spray of the air freshener that he keeps around for other reasons, and after wiping himself off with a towel that gets promptly tossed in the hamper, and after changing into fresh jeans and tee, he saunters off to the kitchen, feeling refreshed and ready for the day.

The house mom—all the kids call her Grandma, and she’s easily the nicest house mom Loki’s had; he’s pretty sure she knows about the cigarettes but has decided to choose her battles—is already at the table, grey hair pinned up, mug of coffee in front of her, reading the paper.

“‘Mornin’,” Loki says.

She doesn’t answer. Not that time or when he says it again, doesn’t respond when he waves his hand in front of her face. Just turns the newspaper page with a loud rustle and takes another sip of coffee.

 _She’s not ignoring me. She doesn’t do that_. Loki repeats the words to himself but it doesn’t help, when his brain starts coming up with reasons why she might start. It’s not like he hasn’t done things to deserve it.

He races back up the stairs and is glad the others aren’t up yet, because the bathroom’s all his, the noise of the shower drowning out his choked, rasping breaths, the hot water washing away the last dried traces of come from his torso. He scrubs extra hard.

When he makes it back downstairs, hair lank and wet on the back of his neck, Grandma smiles at the sight of him.

“Just in time to help me with pancakes,” she says, and he does, shoulders up and nervous in a way he hasn’t been in a long time, trying to understand what just happened. And it’s the weirdest thought he’s ever had, the answer he comes up with, but it’s better than the alternatives, so he goes with it. _She really couldn’t see me._

He’s been aware of magic in a vague and unspecific way, much like he’s been aware of particle physics but doesn’t have much reason to think about it because it doesn’t really factor into his life. But he knows the things everyone knows about spells—that there are, in fact, _magic words_ and magic symbols for those who know how to use them, and that _essences_ (bodily fluids, he’s fairly sure, reading between the lines) are sometimes used in inscribing those symbols and words.

He thinks of his fingers pushing his come around on his chest and he wonders what little gesture spelled out “invisible.”

 

**Age 10**

When Loki learns that his father is dead, a hollow opens up inside him. That’s the only explanation, the reason he doesn’t feel any of the things he’s supposed to feel.

He doesn’t cry. He’s happy. He’s relieved, and feels guilty for it, but doesn’t stop feeling relieved. He wonders if he believes dad is with mom now, and he wonders if mom wants dad there, and he has to stop thinking about it before he does start crying.

Also, he’s terrified.

They always moved around so much, wherever dad was stationed, that he always thought he was prepared for anything. But he remembers dad’s old threats when he acted up, that he’d send him away, put him up for adoption, let someone take him who would show him what _horrible_ really is.

The first foster family they place him with, it isn’t far wrong. There are already two other foster kids there, a deaf girl and her older sister, whose parents were drug addicts, and he thinks at first it’s because the younger one can’t hear, why they’re both so quiet. Then he finds out otherwise.

He gets so used to not saying anything that at school they start to call him down to the nurse’s office so the counselor can talk to him, asking how he’s handling _the adjustment_.  He’s not sure whether they mean having two dead parents or living with people who hate him, but he only shrugs.

“Fine,” he says.

Around that time he starts daydreaming in class. Imagining that he’s someone powerful. A bad guy, probably, because they’d never let him be the hero. Imagining making everyone do what he wants. Sometimes he imagines fighting the heroes—like Captain America from the old comics—and beating them, making everyone see that they should have cared about _him_ from the start, should have seen that _he_ was important, that _he_ was strong.

The daydreams run away with him, details cropping up that he doesn’t remember inventing but he must have. His favorite enemy, the guy with the big hammer, and every time Loki beats him, he winds up on his knees looking up at Loki and apologizing, saying he’s sorry, begging Loki for mercy and saying that if Loki stops, if Loki agrees to use his power for good, he’ll tell everyone how wonderful Loki is and they’ll all love him.

Loki always takes great pleasure in saying no and making him pay instead, because he knows he’s being lied to, and anyway that’s not what he wants anymore.

One year after his dad’s heart attack, Loki catches himself missing him. Wishing everything could be back the way it was. But he knows he doesn’t really want that. He wants something else, something he is sure is yet to come.

He wants the future to come sooner. Anything would be better than this.

 

**Age 5**

Other kids have imaginary friends. Loki has an imaginary brother.

He doesn’t talk about him anymore, because of the way his father looks at him when he does, but he’s already used to lying about everything so it hardly makes any difference.

“I’m _supposed_ to have a brother,” he had said when he first realized it, making his father scowl, and he kept on talking about it for long enough that the next day in kindergarten he had to repeat what his father told him to say.

“I fell,” he said, when the teacher asked. “An’ hit my head.”

His imaginary brother held his hand and made it easier, and that night after supper (cold Spaghetti-Os, because dad wouldn’t look at him and he wasn’t allowed to use the stove by himself) his imaginary brother tucked him into bed and told him a story and then climbed in beside him so Loki could snuggle up next to him, his brother’s arm warm around him. He felt safe. He felt loved.

“Sweet dreams, Loki,” his brother said, whispering against his hair, and for the first time that Loki could remember, he fell asleep without being afraid.

Loki knows he’s supposed to have a brother, so he keeps on imagining him. Sometimes he swears he can really see him, can really hear him. If he squeezes his eyes shut and lets his mouth slip open, he is sure he’s about to say his name, and if he names him, then he’ll really be real.

For several months Loki imagines him. Then one night he’s sitting in his bedroom trying not to cry and he realizes that it doesn’t help. It doesn’t help because there isn’t really anyone there to protect him. It doesn’t help because he’s actually alone.

He’s supposed to have a brother, but he _doesn’t._ He would almost hate his brother for not existing, but even he can see how futile that would be. The world is all wrong, but there’s nothing he can do about it.

He’s on his own.

 

**Age 35**

When the world ends, he starts to remember.

He remembers all the _other_ Lokis. He begins to remember, rats rustling in the shadows, ends up huddled behind a dumpster, feverish with the onslaught, arms up over his face. Remembering lives that are not his, are so different from his seedy, miserable life, his life full of squalor and hunger and endless fruitless searching. Sobbing into his hands as the world distorts and shatters all around him.

So many lives. So many worlds.

He remembers everything. He remembers _Thor_.

When he sees the Thors in a news report for the first time, he laughs for an hour afterward, doubled over against a streetlamp. He knows he’s not doing his reputation for insanity any favors, but he can’t help it: he dreamed them all up. There’s no other answer. They exist because he once had an imaginary brother, an imaginary pet, an imaginary lover. They exist for him. There is no Doom, no All-father of Battleworld, holding all the pieces together; it’s all him and he is actually God. He is the only real thing in all the world.

He looks down at himself, at the ragged and stained green jacket and pants, at the tired, scarred, filthy skin. He snorts. _Yeah, sure._

Looks back up to the tv in the store display and watches it intently, fascinated by each new face, some only slightly different from each other, others entirely so, but all deeply familiar. He knows them all. His heart tugs painfully toward some. For others it races, fingers clench. All the sourceless emotions and strange urges that have ever washed up over him like an unexpected tide, confusing him, tugging him through life like an undertow, this is the source of them. The face that has been missing.

_Thor._

Excitement, so much he feels like an adolescent again, unsure and unsteady and completely focused on his one infatuation. So many lives. So many worlds. A brother. An enemy. A beloved. Everything.

Loki wants him furiously. Needs to find a way to see him.  

He tells himself he isn't afraid, but of course he is. Deprived for so long, how could he not be, when finally faced with the chance? So he holds off on making any move, needing time to plan, time to prepare. Time to simply savor the forgotten taste of possibility.

He avoids the Thors as studiously as he can, because he doesn’t want the answer yet.

He dreams every night now, but it’s not the same dream anymore. Dreams that leave him on edge and trembling. Dreams that drown him in desires he has long since forgotten, long since abandoned—no warm body ever beside him, no one ever there. Dreams that wake him up with the laughter shaking through him. Stares up at the sparkling stars in the cardboard sky and grins a wolf’s smile.

He starts to put out feelers, just on intuition—or old knowledge, knowledge older than his bones, that something is going to happen. Calls on his magic—not the handful of paltry spells he’d discovered on his own, but the first tugging thread of all there is, from a thousand worlds. Comes out of his hiding. Makes connections again. Shedding his fears like a snake’s skin, leaving them behind. Feeling like himself and knowing what that means for the first time.

When it actually begins, he smiles to himself. It’s going to go so badly, but there is no one else in this patchwork world who can put together the pieces as he can. Thor won’t trust him, of course, but that’s nothing new and Loki knows how to work with it. He’s looking forward to it. The sting of lightning, storms so near to his skin instead of far away across the skies so that if it kills him, he’ll feel everything.

He smiles in the shadows, eyes flashing in the dim slant of the streetlights, the city murmuring all its secrets around him.

He’s right where he needs to be.

 


End file.
